My boy will eat anything, which is great. I currently feed him the Hikari Bio-Pure Freeze-dried Blood Worms. Once in a couple weeks or so I give him some other sort of Hikari micro pellet that I feed my danios because I want to make sure he gets all of his vitamins.

I read in the sticky "Your New Betta- Day One" that freeze dried foods should be avoided, or just used rarely. I would love more information as to why they should be avoided and what i should switch to that still has 65% crude protein. Live food is not really and option right now, but it could be in the future. He seems to be doing really well, so if I do not have to switch his food that would be great too.

I've been told that freeze-dried foods lack in nutrition and can cause bloat.

That said, I personally have been feeding my betta 2 freeze-dried bloodworms every morning with no problems at all. Aquarium Care of Bettas by David Boruchowitz doesn't say anything about freeze-dried foods being bad for your fish. Nor has he said anything against freeze-dried foods in any of his other aquarium books and since he's been keeping fish for over 60 years, I figure he knows what he's talking about. In fact, I'll quote his book Freshwater Aquariums.

"Freeze drying is a process in which water is removed under pressure and low temperature - a method that preserves much of the original nutrition and palatability of food organisms."

The best way to feed your betta is with a variety with several very small portions a day. This is the best way to ensure your boy is getting everything he needs. Feed some micropellets one time, some micropellets by another maker another time, some bloodworms another time etc. In fact, I think that is what the author of the sticky is saying: freeze-dried bloodworms should be fed in small amounts but not for every meal.

Whether you decide to feed freeze-dried foods or not is totally up to you, but I still recommend a variety of foods in small portions. I really hope this helps you.

Last edited by Sakura8; 05-16-2011 at 03:13 AM.
Reason: Stupidly forgot some info

Yeah, there's probably a chance frozen foods could carry parasites, but mostly it's live foods that you have to worry about that. Personally, as long as there's freeze-dried and frozen, I'm not messin' with live foods. Call me squeamish but I'm not capable of handling and feeding live, squirmy worms and stuff.

From what I have read freeze dried bloodworms are just not that nutritious compared to other foods. Why don't you just buy Betta Bites or some kind of pellet food designed for bettas and feed that as a staple and the freeze dried blood worms as a treat twice a week or so? Right now that is all I'm feeding (pellets and bloodworms) because floating food isn't going to pollute my water as opposed to foods that may sink to the bottom that my betta will miss. And my tank is cycling so I have to be careful with that.

I am just suspicious of pellet foods. After the dog food scare in '07 I really cannot trust fish food. Half of the foods I look at have ethoxyquin, or have too much vegetation for my liking for a fish food.

What do these guys eat in the wild? I know it is mostly bugs, but what type?

In the wild, they eat mosquito larvae and very small insects like that. Are you suspicious of just pellets or is it all prepared foods like flakes and wafers, too? The whole pet food thing was totally scary and I've changed my cats' food about four times since then, but I don't ever remember it spilling over into the fish food industry. (I think they are more careful about what they feed fish because so many fish are for, er, human consumption)

Hahaha. Actually, my betta's lucky he gets the freeze-dried bloodworms. When I first started feeding them, I used a tweezer I was so squeamish. :) Didn't last long, the tweezer kept crumbling them into tiny bits.

I think the squeamish thing goes waaaay back to my first betta years and years ago when I was in second or third grade. Back then, there weren't any pellet foods for bettas and all you could feed them were frozen, slimy, stinky brine shrimp. That poor betta was lucky he lived half a year. That's why I'm doing my best with my betta Sherman now, to make up for poor "Princess Rose." (Felt guilty about that for years now) Yeah, I also didn't know he was a male.

I got some Cichlid food at Petsmart yesterday because it was the only thing that was not a flake food and still healthy enough. Once I can get to a better stocked Petsmart or Petco, or better yet, my LFS (but it's so far away! :/ ), I will get something else. But so long as variety is the spice of life, he can eat Cichlid food for now in addition to his freeze dried worms.

I don't have a problem per-say with live food, I have a tarantula, who eats crickets, so I sacrifice them all the time. What I do have a problem with is finding somewhere to raise the foodstuffs when space is at a premium in my room. Once I go off to college I might be able to swing growing my own food since I will only have my fish, hence why I said I might be able to grow it in the future, like a few months.